Bastardized English Prevail!
Today was the Sultan of Terennganu's birthday/coronation depending on who you ask... and if you ask the internet it's the anniversary of his installment. This means that Sarah's teachers have a better grasp on the English language or that mine just want to feed me misinformation. Either way since Sarah was right, I should buy her a Coke or something. Or a gift certificate to Dr. Fish. I'll think of something. So to celebrate the sultanic installment, Sarah and I took the moto to Kuala Terengganu and since we took a shortcut we got to play the exciting game of dodge the cow mine. While I had been previously been warned (twice) to watch out for the cows on the road, cow deposits had not been mentioned. They should've been. When you hit a cow patty in a car the only danger is that you might spray the car behind you. But hit one on a moto and... well, let's just say I don't know what happens and I didn't really want to find out on my first Sultan-day. Luckily, I'm an expert enough motoist that if any cow mines were hit, they weren't by us.
KT brought Sarah and I the many wonders of watching My Big Fat Greek Wedding with Anna and Gwynne and eating a bowl of thick noodle soup (keow tiaw sup) which I'm pretty sure had sea urchin or starfish in it. In case you're wondering, it's chewy.
Yesterday at school, we had a qualifier for a state Spelling Bee (for English of course. Malay is all phonetic, so there's no real sport there.) and the first rule was:
1. British English will prevail.
Note, it was not "we won't accept American spelling in this Bee," nor did it say "we believe that favour and colour are vastly superior to those same words pronounced identically but without the extra 'U's." No, it said that British English will outlast and conquer its bastardized American offshoot. Saying British English will prevail sounds like saying "the South will rise again," or "John Edwards will be the Democratic nominee." I don't know what this British prevailing looks like, but I'm going to be on the lookout for it. And to thwart either English from prevailing too much, I'm going to be teaching another bastardized offshoot. Let's just call it Bastardized English. And I got news for you, Legitimate Englishes, there's a whole heckuva lot more people speaking Bastardized English than any other form of it. In fact, they're all over all but two countries in the world (I'll be damned if I'm counting Canada as legitimate).
So lookout, Real English. Your pretty little articles might someday be gone and you better get used to hearing "he eat," "she punch," and "it smell." Because I'm not just teaching Bastardized English because I want to, it's because I've tried to teach the kids how to conjugate regular verbs in the third person singular, and it just doesn't seem to be sticking. It was a lot of work to get them to add the "S" in, so I'm going to change strategies. Bastardized English Prevail!
-Ez
PS Also watch out for cow mine. It smell.
KT brought Sarah and I the many wonders of watching My Big Fat Greek Wedding with Anna and Gwynne and eating a bowl of thick noodle soup (keow tiaw sup) which I'm pretty sure had sea urchin or starfish in it. In case you're wondering, it's chewy.
Yesterday at school, we had a qualifier for a state Spelling Bee (for English of course. Malay is all phonetic, so there's no real sport there.) and the first rule was:
1. British English will prevail.
Note, it was not "we won't accept American spelling in this Bee," nor did it say "we believe that favour and colour are vastly superior to those same words pronounced identically but without the extra 'U's." No, it said that British English will outlast and conquer its bastardized American offshoot. Saying British English will prevail sounds like saying "the South will rise again," or "John Edwards will be the Democratic nominee." I don't know what this British prevailing looks like, but I'm going to be on the lookout for it. And to thwart either English from prevailing too much, I'm going to be teaching another bastardized offshoot. Let's just call it Bastardized English. And I got news for you, Legitimate Englishes, there's a whole heckuva lot more people speaking Bastardized English than any other form of it. In fact, they're all over all but two countries in the world (I'll be damned if I'm counting Canada as legitimate).
So lookout, Real English. Your pretty little articles might someday be gone and you better get used to hearing "he eat," "she punch," and "it smell." Because I'm not just teaching Bastardized English because I want to, it's because I've tried to teach the kids how to conjugate regular verbs in the third person singular, and it just doesn't seem to be sticking. It was a lot of work to get them to add the "S" in, so I'm going to change strategies. Bastardized English Prevail!
-Ez
PS Also watch out for cow mine. It smell.
Comments
Woe be to those cows who left mines for you and Sarah. If they didn't win the battle against your moto yesterday, I am convinced that they won't win the war. Don't quote me on that.